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Converting waste plastic into filament!

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    Converting waste plastic into filament!

    Waste plastic is a massive problem. It is estimated that only 1-3% of all plastics used are recycled and the material is almost always non-biodegradable. Already this year, over 6 million tons of plastic waste has been dumped in oceans. As a planet, we need to do more!
    As we all know, 3D printing will be the next industrial revolution – estimated to be worth $16 billion by 2018 and helping to innovate industries such as aerospace, medicine and education. As a result, we are hoping to develop a recycled 3D printing brand for our existing company, Filamentive Limited. This month I have been shortlisted for the Shell LiveWIRE Smart Future Award for my idea involving the reprocessing of waste plastic into 3D printing filament.
    Waste plastic will be acquired from organisations such as recycling firms, schools, colleges, local councils and 3D printing hubs. Suitable plastic will then be shredded before being melted through an extruder machine and wound onto spools ready to be sold. We will then keep in contact with buyers of our recycled filament so they can send back their unwanted prints – for example, in exchange for new, discounted/free spools. As we grow we hope to expand into the developing world where waste is even more apparent. Local people will be employed to sort through waste and local manufacturing plants will act as partners to process and produce our recycled filament for their respective local markets.
    In order to win the £5000 funding and receive mentoring from senior business leaders, I need as many votes as possible on my 60 second pitch (third video – Ravi Toor). Voting takes a few seconds, simply click "cast my vote" on my video, enter your name and email address and then remember to click the link in the confirmation email you receive. It would be amazing to win this award, as our company will be able to develop a product that will hopefully help reduce such a big problem. I would highly appreciate it if you could vote for me using the link provided below and also share on your own social media if you feel as passionately as we do about converting one of the world’s biggest problems into sustainable future solutions.
    http://www.shell-livewire.org/awards...me/#votingarea
    Thanks to those who support me, I really appreciate your support! Please feel free to ask any questions, either related to my business or anything else for that matter!

    #2
    And this is significantly different than the already huge million dollar recycling industry how?

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      #3
      Perhaps i've confused you somehow. 3d printing is designed to be more sustainable - less wastage, faster production, lower emissions. But currently, the feedstock used, especially plastic, is mostly virgin material so we are undoing all of the good work by using producing all the pollution, wastage and environmental damage associated with producing virgin plastic. As a result, we plan to create a filament that is aligned with the fundamental 3D printing goal of making things more sustainable. We also encourage the businesses and individuals using 3d printing to send their failed/wasted filament back to us so it can be reused. Although demand from other industries is much higher, 3d printing is growing and so as it does we will be able to meet this demand for feedstock by converting as much waste that is possible into usable filament. Our long-term goal is to decentralise our operations to the developing world where waste is more apparent. Local waste pickers will be given a fair wage and trained to sift through waste for suitable plastics that can be used in filament. This will then be sent to local production sites where filament can be produced.

      There are many challenges faced and it is not a simple case of grabbing any old plastic and magically making it into filament. But with the £5000 prize money we can spend on the necessary R&D.

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        #4
        I think some of the problems with 3D printing becoming sustainable revolve around ignorance at the consumer level and the difficulty of trying to identify plastics like PLA I'm the US. Did you know China has about 35 plastic categories while we have 7? PLA is part of the 7-Other category which is a lump of different plastics. We really need to update our system to make it easier to identify and recycle our plastics in general. At the library Design Spot we throw most bad PLA prints away and I have heard them tell newcomers that it isn't recyclable. I have been trying to build a filament extruder based on the Lyman designs, but so far am rather frustrated with it jamming up every time I try to use recycled parts from failed prints. (Seems to work just fine if I just wanted to extrude from pellets, but that's not the point in building one.) I have tried different devices to break the bad prints apart. A coffee grinder makes dust out of them which doesn't feed well. The best was to use a blender with a glass jar. I then run that through a steam pan to sift it for size. I've tried everything from VW Windshield wiper motors, cordless drill motors to 12 Volt geared motors and it still jams up. I keep looking at the more commercially available extruders out there. There's one for $800, but at that price point I want it to grind the prints up automatically rather than by hand. I wish there were places where we could take our bad prints, rafts, support materials to and they'd give us a discount on purchasing recycled filament based on the amount we turned in, but I know adoption of 3D printing would have to become much more widespread before that business model would be sustainable.

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          #5
          I have saved all my waste plastic from day-1. I use the larger failed print pieces to test adhesives, smoothing techniques, and painting practice, and are kept for reference. All of the smaller "junk" bits such as rafts and smaller failures get "recycled" into ABS Juice(R) and are used for smoothing/welding. I even keep the empty spools around and use them for all kinds of things. Nothing gets wasted.

          While it's a nice thought, but waste from 3d printers accounts for a very tiny fraction of waste plastic.

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            #6
            Hi,

            Recycling plastic is clearly not a new concept, in fact many products including items such as car dash boards and other consumer items will contain a mixture of recycled material and virgin material, this is a common practice. Transportation costs need to be considered, in terms of both monetary and environmentally costs. We have developed a solution called FilaFab which can recycle plastics into 3D printer filament, at the point of collection and usage. FilaFab has been designed from the ground up to be specifically suitable for recycling not only failed prints and scrap but also other types of common plastic. More information can be found on our Indiegogo campaign Indiegogo . Or at our website http://d3dinnovations.com/filafab

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